Steve McClaren blamed for killing camera sales

 

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By Barry Collins

Posted on 24 Jan 2008 at 14:11

He's been blamed for failing to lead England's most gifted generation of footballers to the European Championships - and now Steve McClaren is having to carry the can for costing Canon millions of pounds in digital camera sales.

The company, which is one of the sponsors of Euro 2008, has based huge swathes of its forthcoming marketing campaign around the football tournament. But with England's players consigned to spending the summer in Ibiza nightspots rather than Austria and Switzerland, Canon fears that it may have scored an own goal with its £4.5m marketing campaign.

"[England's failure to qualify for Euro 2008] is quite painful from a business as well as a personal perspective," says Guido Jacobs, marketing director for Canon UK. Although considering Jacobs is German, we suspect it's the loss of revenue, rather than Rooney et al, that's keeping him awake at night.

And to emphasise the company's antipathy towards the former England boss, Canon's head of European marketing (himself an Italian), even showed a picture of McClaren cowering under his infamous umbrella on a slide that highlighted the downturn in consumer spending.

Unlike England, however, Canon remains confident that it will still have a summer to remember. "Consumers are moving away from large, life-changing purchases, and moving to renovating the home or updating equipment," Jacobs claims. "58% of people believe it's a good time to purchase household goods."